


Degrees of Freedom

by lidercke



Category: Death Note (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Angst, B is dead, Consent Issues, Happy Ending?, M/M, Memory Alteration, Mental Health Issues, Mental Instability, Watari is put trhrough a lot of shit, Yotsuba Arc, dark!L, everyone has serious issues in this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-22
Updated: 2017-11-22
Packaged: 2019-02-05 10:22:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12792540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lidercke/pseuds/lidercke
Summary: "And L wants to destroy Light, the way all broken things are longing to destroy unbroken ones."Set during the Yotsuba arc when L is struggling to accept the fact that Light is not Kira. He goes trough some really deep shit – depression, flashbacks of a certain serial killer called B, and Light Yagami’s increasingly evident crush on him apparently don’t mix well together.I always wondered what would have happened if L listens just a bit more to his intuition.





	Degrees of Freedom

 

Light is clearly distressed by L’s idea.

“I can’t manipulate another human being like this,” he says innocently.

Oh, how much L hates him. Looking at his honest, offended expression makes L want to beat the living daylight out of him.

The flush on Light Yagami’s face is a threat to L’s whole chromatophobic existence.

“To me, taking advantage of another person’s feelings is unforgivable and the most despicable thing a person can do,” he goes on. L briefly considers forcing the laptop down his throat.

 _Is it possible? Could his personality change so suddenly?_ For, at least in this moment, Light is not lying: he is genuinely grossed out by the idea of using Misa’s emotions to manipulate her into revealing details about the second Kira.

L takes pride in the depth of his knowledge about human nature: it is even more impressive of an accomplishment if one considers his hermit lifestyle. He doesn’t have to actually _meet_ the person to be able to tell in excruciating details about their habits, temperament or choices. In fact, he always thought that meeting someone in person is more of a hindrance than an advantage: they are inevitably going to lie, and then you have to spend valuable time on disentangling deception from truth.

But now Light Yagami has got him utterly confused.

The facts say one thing, yet his behaviour, his tone, his openness… There is no trace of the constantly guarded expression, of the carefully considered movements as if always balancing on the edge. In a sense, L feels that he has just met Light for the very first time this evening.

_What the hell is going on here?_

 

*

This new Light is more vulnerable, L learns this quickly. Sure, he is still a _talented-and-confident-young-man,_ who is perfectly capable of standing up for himself, but the walls that served to keep him safe from L have disappeared. This makes L itchy, uncomfortable; especially when by the end of the first week it becomes clear that Light is rapidly developing a crush on him, probably due to his long solitary confinement and to the fact that currently he is chained to the detective’s right wrist. Thinking about it, a budding Stockholm syndrome is highly likely, but L doesn’t want to take the time to think about it, the situation being awkward enough as it is already. The last thing he needs is to add one more complication to this Gordian knot of an investigation.  

Of course, Light would never act on his crush, and L only knows about it from all the indirect signs the boy is sending. The first day that they spent chained together, Light didn’t have any problems getting changed into and out of his pyjamas in front of L; neither did he have problems when their bodies, unused to the sudden lack of freedom, constantly bumped into each other: elbows collided with ribs, hands brushed each other, knees met soft flesh of thighs during those first few days day.

Now it is all different. Now Light is suddenly shy. He pulls his underwear up under the duvet, sending his pyjama pants to the floor with a frustrated kick. He is also careful to avoid any accidental physical contact, and when it happens, he is overly apologetic about it, even in the cases where it is clearly L’s fault. 

He also blushes.

_God, he blushes a lot._

Evidently, if it weren’t for those blushes, L’s first thought would be when he considers this new development that Light must be acting. There is no way anyone can change this quickly, _with_ _no believable explanation._ Because the only explanation is the one he is most reluctant to believe: Light is not, and maybe has never been, Kira. Kira has the power to use individuals as his puppets, and he can also make them forget about committing the murders if he so chooses.

No, L is reluctant to come to this conclusion: everything about this case suggest a consciousness that he thought recognising in Light’s when he first met him, when he first talked to him at the coffee shop. He _was_ Kira then. L still remembers the excitement, the way the air suddenly smelled sweeter and fresher, the accelerating heartbeat, as if his own heart was trying to catch up with Light’s racing mind. He remembers feeling alive then.

And what does he have now?  A dead end. An eighteen year old student with the most common daddy issues and annoyingly adoring eyes. (L is no stranger to blind admiration and psychotic fanboying. But this is something he really doesn’t want to remember now.)

Even now, L can feel Light’s gaze on him, like a soft, physical touch on his nape; and it is alarming how quickly his senses are adapting to the boy’s presence. He turns his head to Light’s direction to savour the sight of Light’s embarrassment for being caught staring at the detective again.

_“Why are you staring at me? Are you annoyed that I am the only one who has cake?”_

 

*

 

They still have to meet Misa. It would be mentally taxing under normal circumstances, let alone in the semi-depressed state L sank into over the last few days. He himself only realises this now, when Light points out the lack of input from L.

“Motivation? I don’t have any. Actually, I am pretty depressed.”

Labelling it for what it is usually helps; at least now that he has put a sticker on it he knows what to expect. After all, this is not the first time that he arrived at an impasse during an investigation. Same old, same old: the days that grow longer and longer as he sits in front of his laptop; and the nights that never bring sleep to him while his brain runs the same circles around itself. The quiet buzzing of the fan and the pressure on his eardrums. He now shivers and stuffs another forkful of cake into his mouth as he recalls, against better judgement, the last time, two years ago, when he got stuck during an investigation in Toronto. (He vehemently hates the sight of snow since then.)

Of course, Light would never understand this, so L is not bothered explaining it to him. How would Mr. Perfect understand such depths of desperation, he muses. Even if he did, L wouldn’t let him know about his vulnerability. He just has to sort it out in himself, as usual. Might take a couple of days, but then things will get back to normal… or at least to the way they were before.

This heavy feeling of helplessness is most irritating. No matter how many times it happens, L can’t get used to it since this, in essence, differs from the way he goes about things when dealing with the world. Acting on a whim; making the first strike; being calculatedly reckless.

Exactly the way Light punches him in the next moment, hard and unexpected.

 _An eye for an eye,_ he thinks then, but he feels this time it is just not going to be enough; he has to cut deeper into his flesh, through his skin, breaking bones to plant his knife straight into his heart.

“I wanted you to be Kira,” he says the moment when he realises it, and for a second he feels relieved from the heavy weight that has been pressing on his chest for days.

Then Light punches him again, his fist is straightforward and doesn’t leave space for inner monologues.

It is only much later, while he is washing the blood out of his shirt with Light talking to his mother on the phone outside the door, that he brings these feelings up again with a perverted enjoyment over his own hatred for himself.

For it is time to face it: he desperately wants Light to be Kira. He never wanted anything this badly in his life, not even that Christmas pudding Wammy banned him from for setting fire to the library in the orphanage.  He wants to judge Light Yagami for his perfection. He wants to prove him fake and then he wants to destroy him, the way all broken things are longing to destroy unbroken ones; because then _broken_ becomes just a synonym for _normal._ (And that long dead, long forgotten fanboy is laughing, laughing behind his back, _finally we meet again, my love._ )

 It is not possible that all this, all that Light is now, is real; all the helpful gestures, the politically always _oh so correct_ little speeches, the reassuring, bright smiles. It is not possible because it would mean that he, L, really _is_ broken.

He wants Light to be Kira.

 Light has to be Kira, for L’s sake.   

 

*

 

And since L wants to make Light suffer as much as he does, the next logical step is to organise a movie night. He makes Watari set up a home cinema in one of the rooms. The chain is hanging loose between the two recliners (by now they both instinctively know which side to sit if they want to avoid the metal bits annoyingly getting in their way. They don’t even have to think about the logistics any more as you wouldn’t consciously think about inhaling and exhaling.)

The footage L has carefully chosen is an actual tape from an earlier stage of the Kira investigation. He can easily say he wants to go through all the available data and evidence, hoping to spot something they have so far overlooked.

What he doesn’t say is that it is also a perfect occasion to observe Light’s reactions. Is he really faking the whole blushing-crushing thing, as L suspects he is? This is going to be so much fun, L thinks when the video starts playing, and without any further warning they are in the middle of a rather heated sex scene. L grabs a fistful of popcorn while never lifting his eyes from Light’s face.

It has to be given to him that he does everything that he has in his power to control his face; it’s not his fault that at one point he fails miserably. (L always liked _this particular part_ of the footage.)

“Have you ever done this, Light?,” he asks casually.

There is no real reason for L to ask him anyway: he already knows the answer. He long ago deduced from Light’s _faked_ interest in that magazine that Light has never done this, or anything close to it. The situation hasn’t changed with Misa’s appearance, which is truly surprising, although considering the newest developments, maybe not all that surprising at all, L muses, while Light drops his head to the side, cheeks flushing with an ever brighter crimson colour.

“No.” He is very uncharacteristically chewing on his bottom lip, obviously considering the thing he is about to say. “What about you?”

“I have,” L admits. He reaches for another handful of popcorn. “Not on top, though,” he ads nonchalantly, to break the unexpected resurfacing of memories; he can feel the increasing pressure at the edge of his conscientiousness. 

_(“It is like fucking a statue, come on, L”, B complained as he trusted deeper and deeper inside L’s completely motionless body underneath him. “You insisted on this”, L reminded him, sounding rather bored._

_“Maybe if I slam into you hard enough, I manage to break your annoying indifference.”_

_"Highly unlikely, dear.")_

By this point Light must have decided the best tactic would be to simply merge into the armchair; his feet firmly on the ground, he is grabbing the armrest with both hands.  However, his face is still trying to lie to L: the disinterested half smile, the amused eyes are telling an entirely different story from the white fingertips and the flexed calf muscles.

 _Interesting,_ L thinks. _So this is what it looks like when you lie._ Of course, he has no doubts that Light lied to him on many occasions prior to this. But as much as he hates to admit it, he could never catch any of the common telling signs on his face, in his body language or voice. There were no misplaced glances, no suddenly lifted hands, no traitorous changes in his intonation.  Now it is different: this is a _honest_ lie. A teenage boy trying to play grown-up.

If he didn’t know better, L would find it almost endearing.

 

_*_

 

This is how their nights usually go: L doesn’t notice it is already the early hours in the morning, only when Light’s torso adopts a horizontal position on the bed next to him, instead of his usual vertical one. Then he turns to the side so he doesn’t disturb Light with the laptop screen (the boy is overly sensitive about it, apparently), and does his best not to notice how more often than not Light cries himself to sleep. He also goes great lengths to ignore when half an hour later he starts throwing himself around in his dream, fighting whatever bodiless enemy is torturing him that night. L would then wonder why Light keeps doing this. Why does he insist on sleeping? Sleeping is for the weak, he decides.

“Bad dreams?” L would ask him in an indifferent tone when the boy finally jerks awake, sweaty locks stuck to his forehead.

Or, sometimes, Light would awake all of a sudden, eyes popping open without warning, staring at L, just like he is doing now.

“I think I might be Kira,” he gasps.

“This trick of pretending you don’t remember being Kira won’t work; I thought at least that much would be clear by now.”

“It is not a trick. I think…”

“What? What do you think? Tell me, Light.”

L’s clinical eyes finally turn to him in an effort to draw out a confession. Clearly not the reaction Light was hoping for: he casts his eyes down to examine a frayed piece of thread on the duvet.

“Ryuzaki”

“Hmm?”

“Would you promise me something?”

“First you have to tell me what it is, I’m afraid.”

“I don’t want to die for something I don’t remember having committed. If you ever prove that I am, indeed, Kira, please, don’t let them execute me not remembering anything.”

“Yes, that would be unacceptable, I suppose”, L agrees. “However, you see, it is very difficult to prove what one remembers and what one doesn’t. Unfortunately, I can’t see what’s inside your head. For this reason, I can’t promise what you are asking me to, Light-kun.”

It’s like a wave was running through Light’s face, under the skin, washing away the desperation, leaving cold anger on his wake. His voice is a hiss, dripping from venom when he speaks again:

“You might know a thing or two about justice, but you have no idea about mercy, do you? You are cold as an ice cube. I looked up to you but now I only feel sorry for you.”

L examines Light’s face for a long time.

“Tell me, Kira-kun, would you show mercy for me? Would you think twice about killing me?”

“I feel sorry for you,” Light repeats, and turns his back to L.

L then goes back to pretending he doesn’t hear how Light repeatedly throws himself from one side to the other in the bed for the next hour, in vain trying to find sleep.

 

_*_

 

L almost never dreams because L almost never sleeps.

In those dreams that L (almost) never dreams, B’s eyes glow in red, giving a physical expression to the unsettling supernatural air that characterised the real human being while he was alive.

 _B’s eyes were of a deep brown hue_ , L reminds himself. _I must be dreaming then._

“You are like a fucking statue, L. _I want to see if you can bleed at all.”_

L in his dream thinks he remembers this, this is something that really happened: the knife, the blood.

B laughs, and the high-pitched laugh punches holes on the reality of the dream around them.

 _What is so funny?_ , L asks him, voiceless.

 Daylight is seeping through the holes, but L can still hear B’s mocking voice as he emerges to wakefulness:

_That you have to stop being the statue of Justice if you want to solve this one. And jumping down from your pedestal might break your ankle, my love._

*

 

He is now constantly awake but keeps seeing B’s glowing, red eyes nevertheless. Without the face, they are red twin suns in the sky of an alien planet, always searching for him when he looks up from his laptop screen, or suddenly looks out the window of their bedroom, waiting for Light to wake up.

The contours between dream, thought and reality become blurry; they melt into each other, like the colours in the bowl of ice cream that he left on the desk an hour ago and that Watari forgot to pick up.

He doesn’t go to the main office anymore and consequently, Light doesn’t go there either. They work from their room, and when they have to communicate with the team, Watari steps in as L’s voice. L knows that soon he won’t be able to get out of the bed, or feed himself. He hates the thought that Light is going to witness all this. There is a lack of gravity in the room; everything seems to be suspended in the air since this morning.

Light is a beautiful, frightened thing in the chair opposite to him.

The chain is stretched between them as much as it can be, L instinctively trying to find some sort of privacy in this time of suffering. Oh, how he regrets chaining Light to his wrist.

(Light thinks he could just grab the end of the chain and pull L up, but of course it doesn’t work like this. Still he imagines the scene and finds it comforting.)

L doesn’t know what pushes him to hit Light this time, he only realises he is doing it after the third punch, yet he has to do it over and over again until Light is stuck in the corner.

_Stop being always right, stop being so fucking perfect, stop it, I know it is a lie. Have you ever told the truth since the day you were born? Have you, Light?_

“I’m telling the truth!,” Light shouts while lifting his arm over his head to protect himself from the hailstorm of punches.

_So you can bleed… I had to see you bleeding, you are like a fucking…_

_Statue._

L lowers his fist in the shock following the realisation, the same moment when Watari hurries into the room.

 “Let him go, L. Enough.” His voice is gentle, yet firm.

L looks at Light and the fear in his eyes hits him in the chest with a cold, sobering thud. The dilated pupils, the head stuck between the shoulders, the hands still raised in anticipation of another punch: they all mirror the chaos that is raging in L right now.

“He is right. I am sorry,” he says quietly, and shrinks back to his crouching position.

Watari silently unlocks the handcuffs and L lets him, not reacting in any way. Light rubs his wrist; L first thinks in an attempt to ease the pressure, but the longer Light keeps doing it, the more it looks like he was missing the contact with the metal.

“You are not safe here at the moment. I will lock you into the adjacent room”, Watari informs Light.

He takes a few tentative steps after Watari, but then he stops, clearly hesitating.

“What about him?” He turns back towards L, who seems to be nearly catatonic at this point.

“He will get back to his usual self in a few days. Three, four days, seldom more than a week.”

Light doesn’t find this reassuring.

“It not the first time that he is… that he is like this?”

Watari, for once, seems to be out of answers for a while, but when he realises Light is not going to comply unless he gets one, he reluctantly speaks up.

“Everything comes with a price.”

“This is not normal! How can you let this happen to him? Are you not supposed to look after him?”

Watari’s strict eyes narrow to a line.

“And what do you recommend I do?”

“Put the chain back.” He holds out his arm towards the old man.

“I don’t recommend that. For your own sake. You might not see this, but you yourself are in need of help.”

“I don’t care. Put the handcuffs back. Now.”

The sound of Light giving orders makes L to turn towards the scene.

“Put the chain back, Watari. I am not going to hurt him. I promise”, he says to Watari, while looking at Light the whole time.

 

As he secures the handcuff on L’s wrist, Watari leans closer to look into his former pupil’s tired eyes.

“I merely hope you understand what this means,” he says before the metal parts click together.

 

They don’t speak any more that day. But when Light is sleeping, and the lamp on the bedside table is still on, sometime during the night when he starts turning around again, L leans closer to him. Light’s left eye is now puffed up, turning a deep purple shade. He is sweating and mumbling in his dream, trying to fight off something, and L would give half of his soul if he only know _what_ Light is fighting against so desperately. He looks very young now.

Slowly, L reaches out to touch his shoulder. Light jerks awake immediately, and they are blinking at each other in surprise for a few moments.

“You woke me up.”

L is just about to say something in apology when he realises the lack of any accusatory tone from Light’s voice.

“You were having a nightmare again. Do you want to tell me about it?”

Light rubs his eyes, limbs still heavy from sleep.

“It is always the same. I am standing there in the execution chamber.  Alone. Just waiting. Trying to remember why I am there. I know that the door will open under my feet any minute, and I have to remember before that, I have to, but I can’t.” Light pushes himself up in the bed, torso leaning against the headboard. Now his head is next to L’s when he turns to face the detective. “I don’t want to die like that, L.”

“You won’t,” L says slowly, keeping eye contact. There is a monotone tapping on the window panes as heavy raindrops soak the night.

“But if we don’t find Kira…”

“I said you won’t. You can take my word for it.”

Light looks up at him, eyebrows brought close together by the suspicion.

“What has changed?”

“Nothing.”

_Nothing. You just dragged me down from my pedestal, you bastard. Dragged me into dirt and mud. Are you ready to face the consequences?_

 

 

*

 

Light kisses him the night after.

L is at first surprised, although he really shouldn’t be. The kiss starts chaste, just a tentative brush of lips, but when L wants to pull back Light follows him, taking his lips in like someone dying of thirst would do with a gulp of fresh, cool water.

“I am sorry,” he says after, and blushes.

( _Oh, for God’s sake_ , L thinks.)

“I… I don’t usually do this,” Light adds in lieu of an explanation.

“And I hope Light-kun keeps this good habit. Light-kun is still a suspect, therefore it would be unacceptable of me to start sexual relations with him.”

L aims for a detached, objective tone. Judging by Light’s offended expression, he managed to attain it.

However, this does surprisingly little to stop Light from becoming increasingly confident in touching L.

Now, for example: Light is lying across L’s lap, taking a break from staring at screens. Light is playing with L’s fingers, and L lets him, as one would do with a somewhat annoying but cute kitten.

“What happened to the other one?,” Light asks out of the blue. “Your first one.”

“He set himself on fire,” L replies with a deadpan face.

Light actually chuckles.

“I am not joking.” Only on rare occasions does L  feel the need to explain himself, but this is now such an occasion.

“Still,” The chuckle calmed down to a cheerful smirk on Light’s face by now. “what an idiot.”

L looks at him and thinks for the first time that maybe a little, just a little he is falling in love with the boy too.

 

*

_“Let’s all work together and give it our best!”_

Light Yagami is a walking paradox: trust him to become the cheerleader in the investigation against himself. With a pang of nostalgia, L suddenly feels like punching him in his perfect teeth. But know there is something holding his hand back. L would like to think it is B, pulling his shirtsleeve. (But then, B maybe would also point out that L always had a tendency for self-deception.)

It is increasingly harder to stick to his self-imposed rule; Light doesn’t make it easy for him, that’s for sure. He is desperately trying to preserve some semblance of sanity, some last bastion of professionalism. (Piecing together the broken bits of his pedestal with shaking hands.)

 He is telling himself that fervently making out with the eighteen year old prime suspect of the investigation is not the worst possible thing he could do. Certainly, making it out with Matsuda would be way more disastrous, right? (Even he doesn’t believe his own lies anymore.)

Now there are colours. So many of them. Not just Light’s blushes anymore with their subtle orangey-pink hue, but the blue veins as they disappear under the cuffs of his white pyjama shirt; amber, like honey, coating his gaze and it is a cloying sweet colour, sweeter than anything L has ever tasted. He feels shaky and nearly sick if he looks into Light’s eyes for too long.

Then there is red, not the red of lips but the red of blood on a piece of tissue in the bathroom when he gets a nosebleed, and no matter how much L wanted to see him bleeding, he is not sure anymore whether he likes this particular, aggressive colour of red.

The opalesque colour of dried semen in the bedsheets after Lights comes accidentally one night when L was kissing him for too long, clearly longer than he should have, hips grinding against hips through the thin duvet, and Light is embarrassed.

Amber of his eyes, red of his blood, egg-white of his semen on the sheets: all these colours now stain the immaculate whiteness of L’s existence. L sometimes thinks that it is visible, that everyone in the task force can see the change, but he is not really surprised that they don’t: they still trust him, they still trust L as the touchstone of Justice and What’s Morally Right and Sensible, and L is very aware of the ever-widening gap between their L and the L who is kissing Light just a bit too long so he can see his embarrassment when he comes in his pyjama pants, hands still clutching to L’s white shirt.

 

*

Happiness is a dangerous feeling for someone like L, and he is well aware of this.

As his throat tightens when he listens to Light confidently talking to Namikawa, he thinks ‘ _I could have this. I could have him forever’._

 

*

 

His fingers freeze mid-air, between the period ending one sentence and the capital starting the next one. The hairs on his nape are on the edge, first rising above the collar of his shirt, then all the way down along his spine – the unsettling certainty that someone is in the room with him, watching him. He slowly turns his head away from the screen, and twists his neck to look at the doorway.

“Constantly on the edge, aren’t you?” B is leaning on the doorway, wearing his trademark white shirt, baggy jeans, and L’s face. “No need to be alarmed. I’m here to take you on a school trip.”

“I don’t want to go, thanks”, he says dispassionately before turning back to the email the composition of which B’s appearance interrupted. He turns back, only to realise that the screen is gone, the laptop is gone, and he is not in the headquarters anymore.

“Who said it was an option?” B laughs.

“I really hate you, you know.”

“You really don’t, you know.”

“Where are we?” he steps out of the pointless argument.

It looks like an empty warehouse. Then he notices that Light is here.

Light, beautiful Light in blood-soaked shirt and in so much pain L feels it dripping from the walls, seeping through his own skin, and how is it possible he can now physically feel it, the struggle and the racing mind that is still arguing with death, _it can’t end here, it can’t,_ except he knows this is it, this is the end, and the paralysed heart is so heavy in his chest, pulling him down, deep, deep where there is only shame and regret and then not even that.

“Is this happening now?” He hates how his voice is scared. “Where are we, Beyond?”

“At this moment, we are both dead, my dear.”

“I can’t be dead, this is nonsense”

“Light Yagami killed you.”

“You mean, he _will_ kill me.”

“I suppose, if it makes more sense for you,” B acquiesces.

Despite B’s soft pull on his sleeve to keep him back, L can’t help himself: he has to walk closer a few steps. He wants to see Light’s face.

He is undoubtedly older now, even if only by a few years. It is hard to make out anything else than the pain; the agony of his death covers Light’s face, frozen rigid like a funeral mask. L leans in closer, _I knew you would kill me, you killed me long before I died,_ he hears himself saying.

 

He awakes with a gasp of air as if breaking the surface of water.

“You should stop sleeping in front of the computer,” Light smiles at him from above. He holds to cups in his hand, clearly just taken them over from someone, probably Matsuda.

What is he expected to say to that?

_I saw you bleeding to death in a warehouse._

 

*

“You can’t save people from themselves,” Watari reminds him.

L finds it alarming that Watari feels the need to remind him. By now he must have found out. He must have noticed. (In hindsight, he knew it before L himself.)

“Says the man who spent half his life trying to stop teenagers from self-destroying.”

“Yes, and that is exactly why I am warning you.”

Watari places the papers next to L’s left elbow and then steps behind his chair. He has this talent of being present without being intrusive that L always admired.

“You know that he is Kira.”

Watari doesn’t have to answer; his heavy silence tells L exactly what he thinks.

“You know that he doesn’t remember it now. I think it’s genuine,” L adds.

“I agree. He has changed during his confinement. For someone dealing with people for as long as I have, it is glaringly obvious. Probably his father could notice too, but he seems to have always had a blind spot when it comes to his son.”

“What do you think happened to him?” L asks, ignoring Watari’s last bit of comment.

"What you are really asking here is 'who are we fighting against?'. But something makes me think you already have some suspicions."

L is silent for a long time. Is he reluctant to say to words to Watar or to himself? There is no rationality in them, there is no logic, clean and solid as bones holding up the flesh of reality.

He takes a deep breath.

“Some kind of supernatural force.”

Watari actually lets out a whistle, long and jovial, fully appreciating the absurdity of L’s claim.

“Shinigami?”

“Maybe. I don’t know. What I do know is that he _was_ Kira and now he is not. By now I have no doubt that he doesn’t even remember ever acting as Kira. And it frightens me to think of the reasons behind his behaviour. Behind everything that happened. But there is no other plausible explanation. There is none, Watari.”

L drops his fork on the empty plate, staring at it like it was a murder weapon.

“Once you eliminate the impossible…”

“…whatever remains, must be the truth," Watari finishes for him.

“But what if the impossible _is_ the truth?”

“What if, indeed.”

 

_*_

 

 

He fucks Light against a wall on the twenty-eighth floor, between the lift and the green fire safety door. They don’t use this floor much and the lights are all dimmed; it mostly the golden glow of the late afternoon, filtered through darkened window panes.

Light is pressed to the wall, shirt undone, pants and trouser down on his thighs. L holds him firmly, using the vertical surface for support, but still letting Light roll his hips as he pumps two fingers into him. _This might hurt,_ he says when he finally enters him, and Light instinctively tries to recoil but he is now pinned to the wall and has no space to move. L stands still for a few moments behind him, kissing his neck, trying to ease the discomfort. Light smells like fresh apples and blood on the ground of an empty warehouse.

It feels much better than he imagined (for now he must admit that he has imagined this): it is soft and warm inside, and this doesn’t quite match L’s picture of Light’s cold perfection. Yet, it makes sense after the vulnerability that he displayed in the last few weeks. Vulnerability feels like this, like being inside Light.

He starts moving, and soon Light picks up the rhythm too, and their gasps are lost in the empty floor between vacant shelves and dusty desks encompassed by the afternoon light, high above Tokyo.

Later that evening L is looking at bloodshot eyes in the mirror while Light is in the toilet, and he is terrified by the enormity of the task ahead of him. _I knew you would once join the monsters, darling,_ B tells him, and it is unsettling because this time he is convinced he is not dreaming. _It was really just a matter of time, don’t you think? But you know, what I don’t understand is, why now? Why for him?_ ( _Why not for me_ , L hears the unsaid words clearly too.)

 _You never even knew me,_ L replies to the mirror, evading the question.

 _Only I did ever know you,_ B grins, and the reflection dissolves as L sprinkles water on the shiny surface.

 _Shut up,_ he tells his own image.

Behind his back, Light flushes the toilet.

 

_*_

 

He lab is conveniently placed somewhere in the outskirts of Tokyo, at the heart of a maze of concrete blocks.  L sent Watari, himself only following the meeting from behind his laptop screen.

When he switches the camera on, after making sure that Light is fast asleep, all he sees is rows and rows of glass vials filled with transparent liquid, ready to be packed up in unmarked boxes and shipped to another country, possibly on another continent. Watari and the guard who is escorting him are heading towards the door at the back, which turns out to open to a smaller, but even more tightly packed room. Glass and metal tubes run around the wall, and in the middle there is a huge chrome table, completely cleaned up; it’s surface reflects the low hanging neon tubes.

Again, Watari and a guard enter a door at the back, into an even smaller room, this time filled with massive steel refrigerators along the walls on the two sides, and then again, they open a door into a tiny, tiny office. (L is relieved as he was getting rather bored of this game of increasingly minuscule and secretive rooms.)

The figure behind the desk raises as they enter, and the guard leaves the room to stand by at the other side of the door.

‘W,’ the Doctor says.

“Doctor.” L can’t see Watari nodding his head, but his mind completes the scene with the old man’s gestures that he is more familiar with than his own mirror image.

“I suppose your visit has to do with the Kira investigation L is working on.”

L knows the Doctor is merely guessing, yet, it is unnerving how well he guesses each time.

“You know I can’t answer that.”

The Doctor laughs, in his peculiar way: with a sophisticated movement he brings his palms  in front of his face and spreads his fingers wide apart, forming a fan. It always reminds L of some kind of a grotesque geisha figure; something you would see as an illustration for a classic Japanese horror story.  A zombie geisha.

Then Watari speaks up again:

“Do you have what he asked for?”

“I have something that can be of use for you, based on the information you gave me. We have been working on it as an experimental treatment for PTSD and other trauma-related disorders. It has been through some trials involving humans, although only with small samples.”

The Doctor stands up and opens a safe behind his back that turns out to be a small fridge, divided into several neatly separated compartments - possibly for the different projects run parallelly in the lab. He takes a small key from his front pocket, and unlocks the compartment which is marked B4 on the front, the black ink clearly visible even through the micro-camera on the tip of the pen in Watari’s front pocket. 

All L was expecting were some pills. Maybe a set of injections. But definitely not several heavy-looking bags if infusion, which are, firstly: voluminous in size, and second: they pose many problems as for how to administer them to someone unsuspecting.

“I wasn’t expecting this,” Watari voices L’s thoughts as he looks down at the plastic bags.

“What were you expecting than? A magic pill? A miraculous injection that makes you forget all those ugly, bad memories?”, the Doctor draws his mouth to a sarcastic grimace. ‘Laypeople’, he sniffs, before sitting back behind the desk.

Watari is silent, and so is L’s mind for a second. _How this is even going to work?_

‘‘It works,” says to Doctor, demonstrating truly exceptional mind-reading abilities.

“And how does it work exactly?”

Watari sounds sceptical as he should be, but both him and L are painfully aware of their lack of better options.

“It disrupts communication between frontal cortical areas and the hippocampus while another component breaks up the newly formed neuronal connections in the hippocampal areas.”

“Am I right in assuming that it is basically brainwashing we are talking about here?”

L can hear the disapproval in Watari’s voice, but quietly instructs him to carry on with the meeting.

The Doctor looks uneasily to the side before looking back at Watari with serious eyes this time.

“I am not denying that this would never get approval from any official bodies in any democratic country. However…”

“The majority of your costumers are not from… democratic countries, so to say,” Watari finishes the sentence for him. “So, in practice this would erase memories up to a few weeks? Months?”

“The longest we tested is three years. We had to stop increasing the dose because of the side effects.”

“There are side effects?”

“Oh, there are always side effects,” the Doctor laughs in his quirky manner. “The whole procedure is not a walk in the park, to start with. You have to administer the agent over a relatively short period of time: within forty-eight hours for the best results. And I’m telling you, there is a lot of ammo in these little guys”, he pats his hand playfully on one of the plastic bags.

“So only recent memories will be affected, as in a retrograde amnesia. Are there any anterograde effects? It is of uttermost importance for L to know.W

“Ah, so is it for the man himself? He wants to delete some nasty memories while keeping all his brain power?” The Doctor's curious eyes fall on the camera in Watari’s pocket.

“That is none of your concern. Just answer my question, please.”

“There are no anterograde effects that I am aware of. We tested them on subjects with complex PTSD who showed no memory deficits afterwards. Apart from some stuff that went missing,” he chuckles again. L really wishes the guy would stop finding himself so damn funny.

“Were the subjects aware of their memory gaps afterwards?”

“You want to know a lot of things, eh?’ He leans back in his chair, frowning. ‘Look, I could lie and tell you that they are perfectly happy puppies now, but believe it or not, I have a great deal of trust for L and what he does. So I am going to be honest here: the brain, especially the human brain, is too complex to allow complete memory deletion. That is the stuff of science fiction. Memories, even when blocked, even when seemingly deleted, leave affective and, in some cases, behavioural traces, scattered in different parts of the brain. What these guys do’, he nods towards the table, ‘is that they make it nearly impossible to consciously recall events of the recent past.”

“But it doesn’t mean that they won’t manifest in other ways.”

“They _can_ manifest. In some cases they do, in others they don’t.”

“I understand.” Watari nods. (In L’s mind, anyway.) “Now let’s talk about the finances.”

 

*

 

Light is standing at the window, looking out at the darkness that is slowly swallowing the city, and the thousands of yellow eyes staring back at him. He has already undone his tie, which is hanging loose on both side. He looks tired.

L is supposed to be working, but he can’t help every now and then stealing glances at Light. His suprasternal notch is a gentle valley between the two hills of his white collar. L wants to worship him: he would like to give in to this pull that makes him want to throw himself in front of his legs. But he doesn’t.

“Light-kun looks tired,” he says instead.

“We all have been working hard recently, I suppose.”

L raises from the chair as if someone grabbed him by the shoulders, he feels weightless and dizzy as he steps next to Light.  

 _Forgive me,_ he wants to ask him, _forgive me for what I have done and for what I am about to do,_ but there is no point apologising for something he knows is the only way to keep them both alive. It must be the nervousness of the night before the morning after.

He kisses Light who responds immediately and vehemently, hands coming up to meet behind L’s neck, and Light is holding onto him like someone who is about to drown. _I’ve got you,_ L says this time, loud and firm, and Light looks up at him, eyes begging. _I am Kira,_ everything about his gaze screams to L. _I am Kira and I will have to kill you, and in doing so Light Yagami will die too._

L once used to think that Justice exists above everything else; that it is only justice that can hold this chaotic, swirling matter of human minds and hearts together.  L used to think about Justice with a capital J when a case got impossibly difficult, or required near superhuman sacrifices.

Justice now tells him to keep going on with the investigation, to do everything in his power to bring Kira to it. But somehow, L now suddenly fails to see how a long fall with a rope around his neck (here, where L laces his fingers to feel the murmur of his pulse) would represent justice for Light.

How on Earth destroying this perfectly crafted structure of bones and flesh and skin would represent justice. How killing, Light Yagami wouldn’t make him just as bad as Kira.

_Do you know mercy, L?_

He drops to his knees, _forgive me for all the different ways I have failed you_ , and sucks Light off there at the window. Light’s fingers dig deep into L’s shoulder, and he lifts his other arm to cover his mouth. L reaches up, pulling his hand away by the shirtsleeve.

“I want to hear,” he says, voice deep with lust. “Let me hear.”

Light first bites his lower lip, still fighting the sounds that are about to escape his lips, and finally failing, a desperate moan slipping out along a long inhale.

They are going to air the interview at Sakura TV in less than two hours. One way or the other, this all will be resolved.

_We are running out of time, my dear Light._

 

_*_

L meets Kira in person only once, briefly, just to make sure. He touches the piece of paper from the notebook to the back of Light’s hand, and he hates how he is _never_ wrong.

 

*

There is no escape from the pain. He peeks above the threshold of consciousness and there is pain; he ducks from it back to the depth of oblivion, down, deep down to the land of his nightmares and there is pain too, splitting his head in half. He never thought that this overused expression, _splitting headache,_ can feel so real. He hears his skull cracking. He awakes with a jolt, trying to leave the sound behind.

“Light.”

L’s voice is uncharacteristically soft, as if he knew. Light’ doesn’t see him: the first thing he sees when he tries to lift his hands to his eyes to block out the intrusive light is that his hands are tied to the bedframe. Weakly, he is struggling to free them, trashing around in the bed, but he realises his ankles are tied too. This instantly fills him with panic, but his voice sounds muffled when he screams, like he was still in the nightmare.

“Light. Light!” L’s voice is somewhat louder now, further adding to Light’s pain.

“Switch it off,” he manages to mumble, but even he can’t make out his own distorted words.

“I don’t understand.”

“The light. Please. Make it stop.”

Finally L gets it, and reaches for the switch, leaving only a dimmed light on, just enough to see the other’s face.

“I’m sorry. Forgot about this.”

It is a bit better. Maybe he can speak now. If only his thoughts weren’t so fuzzy -  words emerging and floating away from him, and his mind is somehow too slow to catch them. He opens his mouth, only to close it again, and this makes him feel incredibly stupid.

“It’s okay, Light. You have a concussion. You have to rest. We can talk later.” L leans closer and his fingers fiddle with something on the infusion stand next to his bed, then the room goes pitch dark again.

 

*

 

The pain is still there next time when he wakes up, but it is a different now or maybe he is just getting used to it.  Anyway, at least he can form some questions in his mind, even though with great difficulty.

“Why am I tied down?” he asks in raspy voice. L jolts awake from what seems like one of his wakeful naps in the armchair next to Light’s bed. He immediately unfolds himself from ‘rest’ to ‘alert’ position – although there is not much difference between the two, and even that is probably only visible to Light, who has spent months chained to the man.

“We were afraid you would wake up and hurt yourself. You were very confused earlier.”

“I don’t remember being confused,” Light frowns.

“Yeah, this is part of it, I suppose.” L smiles at him, actually _smiles_ , even though he quickly readopts his bored expression after.

Light considers his answer for a moment.

“Where are we?” he asks then, although it hardly matters, considering his mobility issues.

“You are in Okubo hospital in Shibuya.”

“Why am I in a private hospital?”

“We don’t have the necessary equipment and expertise to deal with this at the medical room in the headquarters. Plus after Kira’s attack, we can’t guarantee it is secure at the moment. This seemed like the safest option.”

 “My head is killing me.”

“That is normal, under the circumstances. Maybe you can try and get some more sleep.”

“No, I think I have slept enough. I want to get up. Could you undo the straps?”

“I’m sorry Light, I can’t do that just now.”

L sounds truly sorry, and this is alarming.

“Why not?”

“You have severe concussion and you have to stay horizontal for the time being.”

“Nonsense. I have to go to the toilet”, Light huffs, and starts pulling at the wide cuffs again.

“I’ think I should inform you about the catheter that served you so well while you were asleep.”

“Inform me about… Oh.”

The understanding makes him quiet for a moment, eyes closed in an effort to stop the nagging pain in his head that pulses in nasty, slow waves through his skull.

“Make it stop,” he whispers. “Whatever it is, just make it stop.”

“I can’t. I’m sorry.”

‘What do you mean you can’t?! Just give me some morphine, or anything that will stop it!’ Light finds himself enraged by L’s unsympathetic answer, although he is slightly surprised at his own intense reaction. He feels life smashing things, starting with this stupid bed… going on to L’s nose. ‘Let me go!’, he demands, over and over again, never stopping moving his wrists around, which doesn’t seem to have the slightest effect on the sturdy leather straps. Or on L.

The only thing he achieves is that the pain comes back stronger, after all the trashing around. He squeezes his eyes shut and falls back to the pillow, hyperventilating. It’s unbearable. Maybe he is dying after all and L just wouldn’t tell him, something is really seriously wrong with him he can tell, L doesn’t want to tell him, his skull is filled of shrapnel and L won’t help…

“… what’s happening?”

“I already told you, Light-kun. You have a very severe concussion. You are confused and in a lot of pain.”

No, he won’t help, he is paying this stupid game again, him being in control, and he, Light is tied up and helpless and L can do anything he wants and he still won’t ease his pain, he won’t. The frustration brings tears to his eyes, he tries to fight them, _this is too much, I have to get a hold on myself, but something is so terribly wrong..._

The tears trickle down on his face.

Finally, after several long moments, L breaks the role of the impassive spectator and rolls his armchair closer to Light’s bed.

“I’m sorry, Light”, he repeats for what seems the hundredth time. He should realise it is not helping. Nothing helps. “Look, if you promise you won’t get agitated again, I can maybe undo the straps on your hands. Just on your hands. But you need to calm down.”

He glances at the plastic bag hanging next to the bed from a metal stand. It’s nearly finished, but there is two more to go. And the Doctor’s instructions were clear about how important it is to not mix the infusions with other psychoactive substances. Light just has to go through this, preferably mostly awake.

He lifts his hand to wipe away the tears from Light’s face, and is marvelled at the fact that the touch of his skin is exactly the same, ever so soft and clean. Familiar.  Maybe he finds this fascinating because they have been through so much; like they were completely different people from those two  standing under the cherry threes at the university campus, barely more than seven months ago. That Light is now disappearing by some thousand neurons per second from him. Leaving him behind with the horrors and impossible choices of this investigation.

No, it is not true. Light is here. His eyes are clear and hopeful, and he can touch him, and feel his cheekbones, tensed in pain under the soft skin. His face is not a wax-like death mask and he will never bleed out from gunshot wounds lying on dirty metal stairs; he will never be remembered as the most bloodthirsty serial killer of all times.

 It really is just like curing a disease, isn’t it? The treatment might be brutal, but what is it compared to the loss of a life? No. All this, L looks at Light’s pained face, doesn’t measure up to the brutality of the scene that B showed him.

“It will soon get better.”

“Can you now undo the straps? Please.”

L is hesitant, but Light appears to be peaceful at the moment. It may even be a good idea to let him move around a bit.

“You have to promise me that you won’t start trashing around again.”

Light nods, and L starts undoing the straps with patient fingers; even gently massaging the pale wrists to stimulate the blood flow. He stays there, holding Light’s hand for a second, before putting it back to the bedsheet, as if placing a delicate object to the carefully considered, prefect spot. 

Light immediately makes use of his newly regained freedom and tries to sit up completely, only to realise that this is a terribly bad idea: as soon as he moves, the room starts spinning around its axis. He has to close his eyes to stop it, but the damage has already been done: his stomach lifts up to his throat, and he feels with a rush of panic that he is about to be sick.

“I think I’m going to…”

There is barely enough time for L to grab the porcelain bowl from under the bed before Light bends forward and disgorges the content of his stomach into it.

 _The Doctor warned me about this too,_ L reminds himself, as if it would make him feel better about it.

When he drops his head back onto the pillow, Light’s face is ashen.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbles.

“Nothing to be sorry about, Light-kun. Being sick is quite common following severe head trauma,” he says while glancing at the infusion bag again, and he hates himself vehemently.

 _I wish this was easier. I wish I could trust the Shinigami’s word and this wasn’t necessary._ But L remembers all too well the nightmares Light used to have, and the ever-present self-doubt and suspicion that slowly crept upon him over those last days, _I think I might be Kira,_ he would say sitting on the bed, looking back at L, and he could never quite explain why he thinks so.  He just knew, despite all the magical forgetfulness involved in giving up the notebook. L always trusted science more than magic. This time he has to make sure Light forgets completely, and for good. He makes damn sure the sins of Kira are forever washed away from his mind.

The problem is… sins don’t just get washed away, do they? They are merely transferred to someone else. Although L has made his choices, and he is convinced he has made the _right_ choices, he cannot ignore this new weight posed on his shoulders.

Light is sick again, after drinking a sip of water, and then again when he weakly laughs at one of L’s very inappropriate jokes. He doesn’t talk much, words apparently being still elusive, and there are long, dragged out silences when a wave of pain washes over him. L leans closer, resting his palm on Light’s temple in a quaint posture as if he was trying to take Light’s temperature. His palm is cool and Light says it eases the pain. This is all new and extremely weird to L – to think of himself as a source of comfort.

_You have been very unlucky, haven’t you, Light-kun? First you pick up a killer notebook, run into a malicious Death God, and all this adventure lead you to me from all people, a half-crazed detective with almost no ethical obligations or concerns._

_And me, I can’t say that I have been particularly lucky with you, either. This case was a disaster. Officially, I have never found the man behind the Kira murders, and yet now I am tied to an ex-mass murderer for lifetime, and I can’t even enjoy a comfortable righteousness._

The lies are what he knows he is going to hate the most. So far, he managed to get away with minor ones _, ‘concussion’; ‘I can’t do anything’_. He could. He could stop the infusion, He could bring Kira back and get Light executed. But he won’t. Instead, he is killing Kira. Killing Kira neuron by neuron, leaving only Light, beautiful, brilliant, ambitious Light.

This is why he is doing it. Beautiful, brilliant, ambitious Light. He is nothing L has ever seen or was ever hoping to see in his undoubtedly short and pleasureless life. L has never expected Light Yagami to happen to him.

As, he is sure, Light has never expected L to happen.

 Maybe they both have been incredibly lucky after all?

 

*

 

His father visits. It is weird. Somehow wrong from the moment he enters the room, until he finally leaves, not turning back to throw a last glance at his son. All of a sudden Light feels cold.

“I have been talking to him,”L starts explaining. “You will be staying with me for a while. As you know very well, Kira had a great number fanatic followers. We are getting hundreds of threats to the headquarters.”

“Maybe he feels guilty because he couldn’t keep me safe. He shouldn’t.”

“No, he shouldn’t.”

L agreeing with him is a weird feeling, too.

A few hours earlier, while Light was deep asleep, L made Soichiro sign the papers that effectively made him gave up all parental rights. This was L’s main condition of not pursuing execution for Kira:  Wammy to become legal guardian of Light.  He couldn’t see him executed, Soichiro said. He realised this much when he was holding a gun against his son’s head. But he is now painfully aware that he could never contain his genius.

His condition int turn was that he wanted to see Light one last time. L chose to comply with this wish.

“I have to give you back these.” He holds out the plain cardboard box that contains Light’s clothes and belongings. “He can’t keep anything that he has been in contact with while acting as Kira.”

 _Acting as Kira_ is a diplomatic enough description, L supposes.

“Could he not keep at least this?” Soichiro picks out the watch from the top of the box, "he got it from me when he became sixteen. It would help him to remember his family; that he is not completely alone."

“I’m sorry,” L says and gently takes the watch from Soichiro’s hand, then firmly puts it back into the box. “I know how hard it is for you.”

There is a quality of hardness to the pain in Soichiro’s eyes.

“Do you, really?” he asks before he picks up the box from the table between them and leaves.

 _Now I have made you an orphan too,_ L thinks as he watches the door closing behind the chief’s back.

 

*

 

It is the last bag of infusion, dripping slowly into Light turquoise veins. He hasn’t complained of "splitting headache" for a while, and could manage to drink a few gulps of orange juice from the cup that L held to his mouth.

The conversation was more to help L to assess any possible damage or side effects than transferring actual information. L tried not to lie too much, but he knows he can’t avoid the inevitable forever. Light will want to know what happened, how it happened exactly, and all the details included.

L still wishes he could postpone it forever. Despite what he always says to the children in the orphanage, he has lied often and extensively (and sometimes, he has to confess, with great pleasure) during his career as a detective. Often enough to know that lies come with an inevitable consequence: they create walls. They separate you, you who know the truth, from all those who don’t.

With Light, L for the first time in his life, experienced what it feels like to be understood; to share the same thoughts; to share the same mind and maybe, maybe the same soul.

Now this is all going to be over. How ironic. The only way of keeping Light alive, the person who solely understands him, is to build up this wall between them.

“You know, sometimes just by looking at your face, I can tell that you have really sad things going on in your mind. Your mask is not as perfect as you think.”

“I was thinking how we could have avoided this,” L gestures towards the bed, obviously meaning Light’s less than peachy state. “If there was a way…”

“I don’t think we could have. The fact that he managed to get into the headquarter indicates that he had powers beyond our imagination. Have you already found out how he did it?”

“Do you remember anything at all?”

“Nothing much.” Light shakes his head gingerly. “You said he attacked me, right?”

He frowns, because any effort to remember sends waves of intense pain across his skull.

 “How the hell did he get in?”

“Watari told me he found the repetitive sequence on the CCTV recording. He hacked his way into the security system, including the cameras.”

“I thought they were secure.”

“We thought so as well. We didn’t know Kira’s abilities.”

‘The main thing is, we are both alive, and he is dead, right?’

“Yes. He has been shot by police. I saw it happening,” L adds darkly. _I made it happen._

He is only hoping that his words convey enough reassurance for Light, as he would struggle to piece together a satisfactory amount of confirming evidence in support of his story. He is prepared though that at one point or another he might have to do it. Watari has already started putting a file together: meticulously doctored footage of Higuchi’s death, voice recording of Light as he is shouting (as Kira, but he won't know that), _you can’t kill me, you can’t_ , and all the nice bits. It has to be flawless for Light, but it is not ready yet.

L looks at him and all he can see is another pair of eyes he is forever hiding from. The beginning of a long exile.

 _I already miss you_ , he would like to say, but he knows that from Light’s perspective it wouldn’t make any sense. So he stays silent.

 

*

 

At some point a doctor comes in to examine Light. He wears his white lab coat kimono-style folded over; the belt is wrapped around his considerable waist, forming a neat bow on top of his belly button. Despite all these details, he exudes an unshakeable confidence and professionalism. Light can’t help but trust him immediately.

“How are we doing?” the doctor singsongs jovially.

“I am doing just fine,” L replies with a deadpan face, which earns him a scornful look from the doctor, and then the most peculiar giggle Light has ever heard.

“And what about the young gentleman here?”He pulls out the small stool from under the bed and plops down.

“I have been better.”

His headache is ever present, but by now he sometimes manages to ignore it, apart from the particularly excruciating waves every half an hour or so. He hasn’t tried to eat solid food, but judging by his reactions every time he turns his head, it is probably for the best.

L perches up on his armchair so he can better supervise whatever is going on with Light and the doctor.

“Also, I don’t think it is standard treatment for concussions,” Light looks at the infusion stand.

“We can’t exclude poisoning,” the doctor says easily.

“I have been knocked out _and_ poisoned?”

Now it is L’s turn to throw a scornful glance at the doctor, risking that Light notices that something is off. He doesn’t notice, though: at the moment, he is too busy glaring at the pen raised in front of his nose.

"Could you please follow with your eyes,” the doctor instructs him.

Light does as he has been told, but after he is forced to move his head to the side in order to keep looking at the pen, he feels he is going to be sick again.

The doctor patiently holds the bowl for him.

“Is the pain getting worse?” he asks after.

“No. But it is not getting better either.”

‘I am going to take this out now,’ the doctor touches the canula in Light’s hand. The last infusion bag is hanging empty on its stand. Light hisses as the needle slides out from his vein, and L feels a surge of relief. _It is over._

“I will call a nurse to help moving you into a pushchair. We have some tests to run. Just to make sure everything is alright.”

A few minutes later Light throws a panicky glance at L as he is being pushed out in a wheelchair, and all L manages is to muster up a reassuring half smile.

The tests they are doing seem to be in accordance with what he has been told about the accident and the concussion, even if somewhat excessive: he is there for almost two hours. There is an EEG and an MRI, and then a series of testes and finally questions, _what is your name, what day is it, who is L_ (which is just plain stupid because no one knows who L is), _tell me about your happiest childhood memories._ God, like he hasn’t been tortured enough yet.

 

_*_

While Light is in the examination room, L sneaks up to the roof. He has an important, long overdue meeting there with someone.

“It is highly unusual that you seek me out, and not the other way around.”

B is tiptoeing on top of the barrier that separates the roof from a thirty storey free fall. L crosses the concrete square and stands in front of him, looking up to B’s face - for the very first time, really looking.

For now he notices the fine details of his iris; the faint freckles under the paint-thick foundation that makes his face similarly pale to L’s; the renegade hairs out of the line of his carefully shaped eyebrows. All the subtle details that make him _not L._

“I just wanted to thank you.”

B’s eyes widen in surprise. (This, on the other hand, makes him look incredibly similar to L.) He slowly crouches down on the concrete barrier, bringing his face a few inches above L’s.

“I don’t understand.”

L draws his lips to a smug smile.

“It is highly unusual that you lose the plot during our interaction, and not the other way around.”

“Oh, shut up!” B huffs, and with an energetic jump he lands behind L’s back. His feet don’t give off any sound when they the concrete. L quickly turns around to follow him with his eyes.

“As I said, I wanted to thank you”, L shrugs. “The case is over.” B this time lets the uncertainty seep through the distorted grimace that usually covers his face. “Also”, L continues, “I think it is time we said our goodbyes to each other.”

L thinks he is prepared for everything: for B trying to argue, or B becoming unreasonable, aggressive, homicidal even. But none of these scenarios happen. Instead, Beyond merely steps closer, looks at L with sad eyes, and says:

“ _I didn’t kill them, you know. I was innocent in the crime your boyfriend murdered me for.”_

“I know,” L hears himself saying before Beyond leans in and breaths a kiss on his lips, so gentle it could be mistaken for the autumn breeze over Tokyo.

At first L shivers, then he lifts his hands slightly to hold onto the shirt on Beyond’s arms. _I’m sorry you had to die. I’m sorry I couldn’t love you the way you wanted me to._ The words are there half-formed in L’s mind but remain forever unspoken; yet, L knows that B has understood them. The understanding is there in the kiss that drags out for long seconds, then minutes.

It is only much later when L suddenly realises that he has been standing there, completely alone on the rooftop, grabbing into thin air like an idiot.

 

*

And so it begins.

L walks back into the hospital room.

“How was the test?”

“Boring. Where have you been?”

“Debriefing Watari concerning the release of the Kira-story to the press.”

Light’s unassuming eyes strangely remind him of standing in an execution chamber, alone. He swallows heavily.

It will be Light who reaches out, taking L’s crooked fingers into his hand.

“L?”

He looks up, surprised by the sight of a wide smile on Light’s face.

“Yes?”

“Thank you for saving my life.”

Oh, that. Yes, he supposes he did that, didn’t he? He already forgot why he was doing all this.

“It’s alright, Light. I am sure you would have done the same in my place.”


End file.
